Today we are going to practice matching headings and sentence completion questions. Can you remember the tips from Reading Practice 1 on how to deal with matching headings?
Familiarise yourself with the list of headings.
Look for and underline keywords/phrases in each heading. As you do this think of synonyms for the key words. Be careful of headings that seem similar. Think about what makes them different.
Skim over the passage to get the overall gist of each paragraph and match the headings to the paragraphs as you read. Reading the first and last sentence of each paragraph should help you to do this. Don’t get stuck on words that you don’t understand, this type of task is about the general meaning.
In the test, write you answers on your answer paper straight away. You will not receive any extra time to transfer your answers.
Questions 1-8
In the text, paragraphs are labelled A-H.
Match the correct heading to the paragraph.
List of headings:
Failing relationships and negative feelings
Winning the lottery may not make you happier
What is Hedonic Adaptation?
Philanthropy benefits the giver
Wealth management issues
Spend your winnings wisely
What you do, not what you buy
Behavioral Changes
WOULD WINNING THE LOTTERY MAKE YOU HAPPIER?
MJ Mendoza, “WOULD WINNING THE LOTTERY MAKE YOU HAPPIER?” groundreport, http://www.groundreport.com/would-winning-the-lottery-make-you-happier/ Accessed 11.8.2017
Answer EXPLANATIONS
Not sure about some of the answers? Hopefully our answer explanations will help.
What is Hedonic Adaptation?
Paragraph A states ‘This is partially due to a phenomenon called hedonic adaptation‘ and goes on to explain what that means: ‘This describes our tendency to become used to the happiness after experiencing it for the first time.‘
Winning the lottery may not make you happier
Paragraph B informs us that ‘winning the lottery would make you happy but only for a short period of time‘.
Wealth management issues
Paragraph C tells us that ‘large sums of money can be a lot to manage‘.
Failing relationships and negative feelings
In paragraph D we learn ‘Eventually, lottery winners wind up cutting themselves from others because of the fear of being used as a just a source of money than a source of friendship.‘ The words in bold highlight the paraphrasing of the terms ‘failing relationships’ and ‘negative feelings’.
Behavioral Changes
In paragraph E, the phrase ‘some even become greedier than they were before winning‘ is an example of a behavioral change. Later the paragraph says ‘A study… …proves that gaining wealth can actually change our behaviour drastically.‘
Spend your winnings wisely
Paragraph F informs us that ‘While most of us would indulge in a fabulous lifestyle after winning, there are ways that winning the lottery can make us happier than having the latest supercar in your garage‘ and then goes on to introduce us to the best way of spending our winnings (the money we won).
What you do, not what you buy
Paragraph G is an extension of the ideas in the previous paragraph. It states that ‘findings show that people tend to adapt faster to extrinsic and material things than we do on experience‘. Extrinsic and material things are what we buy. Experience is what we do.
Philanthropy benefits the giver
‘giving to others’ and ‘spending on others’ is a paraphrase of philanthropy. Paragraph H tells us that ‘the University of British Columbia and Harvard Business School proved that spending more on others provides more happiness than spending it on yourself.‘
Sentence Completion
Can you remember our tips on how to answer these types of questions? Check out this poston sentence completion to refresh your memory.
Step 1 Skim read the passage. Try and get the general meaning of each paragraph. Don’t read every word, don’t worry about unfamiliar vocabulary. Some people like to make notes at the side of the text about the ‘gist’ (general meaning) of a paragraph, however, for this sort of text it is probably not necessary. Skim reading the text first will allow you to come back and easily find the answers for questions in step 3.
Step 2 Carefully read the instructions for the questions. How many words can you answer with? Remember spelling and grammar is important!
It seems like a simple thing to do but many candidates don’t read the instructions or misunderstand the instructions and so answer questions incorrectly. Make sure you understand what you have to do before you write any answers.
Step 3 Read the questions. You skim read the text in step 1 and so you should have an idea where in the text the answer should be found. Locate the answer and write it. Remember:
Synonyms of words in the questions will help you to find answers in the text.
Make sure you don’t write too many words.
Make sure the words you write fit into the grammar of the sentence.
Check your spelling.
Questions 9-13
Complete the following sentences with NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the text.
9.
You must be to win the lottery as the odds do not favour you.
10.
Being successful in the lottery is less likely than being killed by beasts or .
11.
When people are successful in some endeavor or competition they experience a .
12.
Researchers in America compared the opinions of disabled victims of to those of lottery winners.
13.
Questions required the subjects to how much happiness they felt they received from various unremarkable situations.
Don’t forget that the best way to improve your reading skill is by frequent practice. If you are serious about getting a higher band, then you need to be doing reading practice every day. If you have any tips on how people can improve their reading, then leave your tips in the comments section below.
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